Defendants with repeated competency evaluations.

In order to clarify the nature of those defendants referred multiple times for competency-to-stand-trial evaluations, 390 consecutive admissions to the Yale-New Haven Psychiatric Court Clinic were reviewed. Fifty-four of these had had more than one evaluation in the 2.5-year period under study and will be referred to as repeaters. Repeaters were significantly different from nonrepeaters in terms of diagnosis (p less than .01), tending to be more likely to be schizophrenic or affectively disordered. Repeaters also tended to have less education (p less than .01) and to be found competent less often (p less than .01) than nonrepeaters. No repeater-nonrepeater differences were found in age, race, or legal charge. Implications for future research on and management of this population are discussed.